In Continuum.

Origins

It is difficult to search through the net for Indie singers and bands, but listening to the mainstream radio is much harder. It's like one of those advertisements on television that attempts to persuade you out of smoking by going," Quitting is hard, not quitting is harder". The truth is, I have been on this road of exploration for many years now, finding my way through the vast world of underground music to search of hidden gems and undiscovered talents. People often ask me how and where I find my range of music from, especially when they are from a dozen different spectrum of genres. I have everything from smooth jazz to lounge, from electronic to classical, from rock to rap on my iTunes library. For every genre, there are bound to be artistes that people have never heard before, and all of them have their own little story behind them. So here I am, giving you a little insight on where and how I obtained some of the bands I've got to know and love throughout the years. Of course, I'm not going to scroll through my whole iTunes library and tell you the story behind every single band that you haven't heard of. This list is merely the selected few, and I might do a sequel to this entry in the future, who knows.

Amiina

Amiina is a special band for me, because they make the kind of music people don't usually associate with. When you listen to Amiina, you are going to picture yourself in a room full of people doing Yoga. Like a lot of bands you are going to read about, I came upon Amiina while searching through iTunes Store a couple of months ago, after being completely obsessed with Sigur Ros. The genre of post-rock was new to me back then, and I had the urge to seek out more music from the same genre. There is a function in iTunes Store which tells you what other albums or songs the users who bought this particular album purchased as well. It is located at the right hand side of the screen, and the same function is also available on websites such as Amazon.com. I discovered Amiina through Sigur Ros really, and the four-woman combination was very interesting in the genre of post-rock. I checked their music out, and they grew on me over time.



Blonde Redhead

I remember I was watching the film Hard Candy with Corinna, and the end of the movie ended on an ambiguous note. There were questions about the main character left unanswered, and the two of us remained behind in the cinema to discuss what the hell just happened on screen. It was a great movie, and my sleeves were almost tore off by her because of the castration scene. But anyway, we were the only people left in the theater when the credits started to roll. That was when a song caught our ears, and we were desperate to find out who sang the song while the credits were playing. We stayed until the end, and found out that the song was called Elephant Woman by Blonde Redhead, a band neither of us has heard before. I did a little search on the internet when I got home, and found their albums through Limewire. It was a strange kind of rock music, not nearly the kind of rock you associate with alternative really. It was just strange, but it was because of the same reasons that I fell in love with the band. All thanks to the movie Hard Candy, I wouldn't have found out about the band.



Broken Social Scene

Broken Social Scene actually came about after a discussion about music with Issac over MSN. I remember we were talking about Rachael Yamagata, and how we both share the same passion for Damien Rice. From our conversations, we discovered the little acquired tastes in music that we both share, and that was how Broken Social Scene was introduced to me. Apparently, he has been a fan of the band for years, and he introduced the band to me on the basis that I enjoy Sigur Ros as well. While they are not exactly in the same ball game, I still checked their self-titled album out, and their music turned out to be the kind of music you listen to on a lazy Sunday afternoon - exactly my cup of tea. Broken Social Scene does the kind of music not a lot of people are going to enjoy, because 90% of their album is instrumental. When I say "Instrumental", I am not talking about the classical type, but imagine a rock song without the singing. I liked the way they sound in my room when I am not there, and as strange as it may seem, that is the kind of music that I love.



Cat Power

I heard of Cat Power from the movie V for Vendetta. Apparently, Natalie Portman is such a big fan of Cat Power that she asked the directors if it was possible to include the song "I Found A Reason" into the soundtrack. Somehow, the context of the movie allowed the song to be played in a particular scene, and we hear it in the background over the dialogues between Evey and V. I didn't take notice of the song actually, but was attracted to the melody when I did a search of the videos related to the movie online. There was a fan-made video of the movie with the song as the backing track, and that was how I found out about Cat Power and her cover of the Velvet Underground song. It was love at first listening, and I am still crazily in love with that song even until this day.



Damien Rice

In camp, your best buddy isn't really the person sleeping next to you in bunk, but the music that you bring along with you onto the island. In the first few weeks of the army, I spent most of the time with the music I brought along with me, nodding my head to the tunes of John Mayer and the likes. That was when Kayun approached me about the music I was listening to, and we found out that we both shared the same likings for music. He borrowed my John Mayer CDs for the whole night and fell in love with it in the morning after. As if he owed me something in return, he introduced me to Damien Rice one day in the canteen. We were just standing around waiting for our food to be served when he asked if I have heard of his songs before. He mentioned the song "The Blower's Daughter", and I remember telling him that it was a senseless title to begin with. However, here's the coincidental part. I've been searching for the song in the trailer of the movie "Closer" forever, and knew the first words of the song to be "And so it is...". When I downloaded the song by Damien Rice, I was jumping around in my room, happy that I finally found the song I've been looking for. So here you go, it was Kayun in the very beginning.



Death Cab for Cutie

It is a habit of mine to watch movie trailers online, and there was this time when I came upon the trailer of a movie called Shopgirl. There was a piece of music in the background that played, and the tune was just extremely catchy for me. With the help of the website called Soundtracks.net, I managed to find out that the song was called "The Sound of Settling" by a band called Death Cab for Cutie. I started finding their songs on the net, and I remember the other song that I found from them was "Tiny Vessels". Slowly, but surely, my library of their songs grew, and it erupted into this insatiable love for the band and their music. Which is why I am so excited that they are coming down to Singapore next year, because I can't wait for them to play some of my favorite songs of all time - live.



Frou Frou

Like everybody else who discovered Frou Frou, it was probably through the trailer of the movie Garden State. Let's admit it, the reason why most of us watched the trailer a million times over was because of the song in the end of it that fitted so well with the imagery. The way the lyrics and the melody fitted so well with the tone of the film was unbelievable, and I remember it was the first trailer I saw back then with the title of the song and the artiste tagged to it at the very end. So like all the good music that I have collected over the years, I went through the internet and eventually found the band Frou Frou and their other works. That was also how I found out about Imogen Heap as well. Killing two birds with one stone - awesome.



Jonatha Brooke

She is probably one of the most under-rated singer on my iTunes playlist. The reason being is that she is more than just a singer, but a poet with a guitar in her hands. The kind of lyrics she is capable of are phenomenal, and the first song I heard from her blew me away. I saw the link to her song on iTunes via John Mayer's blog, where he introduces under-rated singers and bands every once in a while. Jonatha Brooke was featured in one of his older entries, and I remember him calling it "The best words to have been written by a singer", or something like that. Intrigued, I went on a hunt for the song on the net, and I couldn't even find it on the first try. That is how unknown Jonatha Brooke is in reality, though everybody should give her song - Because I Told You So - a try. You can't even find much of her videos on Youtube, and that is how difficult it was for me to find her albums. In fact, I don't even have a complete album yet. Imagine that.



Múm

Múm is yet another band from the good island of Iceland. It seems like the only music from that island that I cannot get used to is probably Bjork's, but that may actually change over time - who knows. Like Amiina at the beginning of this entry, I found Múm through similar ways on iTunes Store. However, I first heard of the band way before I decided to do a search on the band itself. I remember watching a video on the internet about the debate between men and women. The video used during the women segment sounded like a piece of music from a Super Mario game. That piece of music stuck in my head for a very long time, but I never got around to find it because it wasn't particularly appealing. However, searching through the web after the Sigur Ros craze, I came upon Múm simply because they have an interesting band name to begin with. I heard that Super Mario song in one of their albums, which was what convinced me to get it eventually. I guess when it comes to finding music, the band name is an important factor after all.